The Lost Generation: A Collection of Quotes from Jack Kerouac’s Novels
Quotes
“‘I was so ashamed. To think, my own son in prison.’
“We walked down to his car, got in. He drove off. He was still weeping. ‘It’s bad enough you don’t want to serve your country in time of War…’
“‘The shrink said I was unfit.’
“‘My son, if it wasn’t for the First World War I never would have met your mother and you never would have been born.’
“‘Do you have a cigarette?’
“‘Now you’ve been jailed. A thing like this could kill your mother.’
“We passed some cheap bars on lower Broadway.
“‘Let’s go in and catch a drink.
‘
“‘What? You mean you’d dare drink right after getting out of jail for intoxication?’ “‘That’s when you need a drink the most.’
“‘Don’t you ever tell your mother you wanted a drink right after getting out of jail,’ he warned me.
“‘I need a piece of ass too.’
“He nearly ran a red light. We drove in silence.
“‘By the way,’ he said finally. ‘I guess you know that the jail fine will be added to your room, board and laundry bill'” Chap. 14, pp. 33-34
“It was slow work; the dust had caked, turned into embedded grime. I cut my hands several times on the edges of the metal slats. The soapy water burned.
“‘Shot of whiskey, Tommy.’
“I finished one set of blinds and hung them up. The patrons of the bar turned to look at my work.
“‘Beautiful!’
“‘It sure helps the place.
‘
“‘They’ll probably raise the price of drinks.’
“‘Shot of whiskey, Tommy,’ I said.” Chap. 22, p. 49
“After losing several typewriters to pawnbrokers I simply gave up on the idea of owning one. I printed out my stories by hand and sent them out that way. I hand-printed then with a pen. I got to be a very fast hand-printer. I got so that I could hand-print faster than I could write. I wrote three or four short stories a week.
I kept things in the mail. I imagined the editors of The Atlantic Monthly and Harper’s saying: ‘Hey, here’s another one of those things by that nut…'” Chap. 27, p. 59
“Then we sat around and talked for a while until one of the guys looked at his watch and said, ‘O.K.’ and they got up and took Willie off the chair and laid him out on a stretcher. Then they carried him out of there and that was it.
“‘Shit,’ said Grace. ‘I’m fucked.’
“‘You’re fucked,’ said Jerry. ‘I still got my fifty a month.’ “‘And your round, fat ass,’ said Grace.”‘And my round, fat ass,’ said Jerry.
“Laura and I knew we were fucked. There was no need to say it.” Chap. 35, pp. 84-85
“I heard and felt the kisses, then felt little licks. Then I forgot all about the bicycle warehouse. Than I heard her ripping up a newspaper. I felt something being fitted over the tip of my dick. ‘Look,’ she said.
“I sat up. Jan had fashioned a little paper hat and fitted it over the head of my dick. Around the brim was a little yellow ribbon. The thing stood fairly tall.
“‘Oh, isn’t he cute?’ she asked me.
“‘He? That’s me.’
“‘Oh no, that isn’t you, that’s him, you have nothing to do with him.’
“‘I don’t?’
“‘No. Do you mind if I kiss him again?’
“‘All right, it’s all right. Go ahead.’
“Jan lifted the hat off and holding on with one hand she began kissing where the hat had been. Her eyes looked deep into mine. The tip of it entered her mouth. I fell back, damned.” Chap. 39, p. 92
“At some point during one of our hellish nights World War II ended. The war had always been at best a vague reality to me, but now it was over. And the jobs that had always been difficult to get became more so. I got up each morning and went to all the public employment agencies starting with the Farm Labor Market. I struggled up at 4:30 a.M., hungover, and was usually back before noon. I walked back and forth between the agencies, endlessly. Sometimes I did get an occasional day’s work unloading a boxcar, but this was only after I started going to a private agency which took one third of my wages. Consequently, there was very little money and we fell further and further behind with the rent. But we kept the wine bottles lined up bravely, made love, fought, and waited.” Chap. 42, p. 100
“Manny and I took a little longer with our lunches and came back smoking good cigars. But it was still a rough ride every afternoon to make the last race. The crowd got to know us as we came running out of that tunnel, and every afternoon they were waiting. They cheered and waved racing forms, and the cheers seemed to grow louder as we went past them on the dead run to the betting windows.” Chap. 46, pp. 107-108
“He struggled and was surprisingly strong. He got his teeth into my left ear; he was biting my ear off. I got my fingers around his throat and choked him. There was one long white hair growing out of his throat. I pushed his other leg through. A picture of Zsa Zsa Gabor flashed in my brain: she was cool, composed, immaculate, wearing pearls, her breasts bulging out of her low cut dress – then the lips that would never be mine said, no. The old man’s fingers were clinging to a plank. He was hanging from the underside of the grandstand. I lifted one hand off. Then I lifted the other. He dropped through space. He fell slowly. He hit, bounced once, higher than one would expect, came down, hit again, took a second small bounce, then lay there motionless. There wasn’t any blood. The people about us were very quiet. They bent over their racing forms.” Chap. 51, p. 117
“It was true that I didn’t have much ambition, but there ought to be a place for people without ambition. I mean a better place than the one usually reserved. How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 6:30 a.M. By an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?” Chap. 55, p. 127
“I had visited the American Cancer Society earlier, as I had understood it to be free. I had lumps all over my body, dizzy spells, I was spitting blood, and I had gone there only to be given an appointment for three weeks later. Now like every American boy I had always been told: catch cancer early. Then you go down to catch it early and they make you wait three weeks for an appointment. That’s the difference between what we’re told and actuality.
“After three weeks I went back and they told me they could give me certain tests free, but that I could pass these tests and wouldn’t really be sure that I didn’t have cancer. However, if I gave them $25 and passed that test, I could be fairly sure I didn’t have cancer. To be absolutely sure, after I had taken the $25 test, I would have to take the $75 test, and if I passed that one too, I could relax. It would mean my trouble was alcoholism or nerves or the clap.” Chap. 70, pp. 162-163
“Bud came back pushing three one gallon cans of paint on the order wagon. He put them on the packing table. They were labeled crimson. He handed me three labels. The labels said vermillion.
“‘We’re out of vermillion,’ he said. ‘Soak off these labels and paste on the vermillion labels.’
“‘There’s quite a difference between crimson and vermillion,’ I said.
“‘Just do it.’
“Bud left me some rags and a razor blade. I soaked the rags in water and wrapped them around the cans. Then I scraped off the old labels and glued on the new ones.
“He came back a few minutes later. He had a can of ultramarine and a label for cobalt blue. Well, he was getting closer…” Chap. 76, pp. 175-176
“Darlene fingered her naked breasts, showing them to us, her eyes filled with the dream, her lips moist and parted. Then suddenly she turned and waved her enormous behind at us. The beads leaped and flashed, went crazy, sparkled. The spotlight shook and danced like the sun. The four man band crackled and banged. Darlene spun around. She tore away the beads. I looked, they looked. We could see her cunt hairs through the flesh-colored gauze. The band really spanked her ass.
“And I couldn’t get it up.” Chap. 87, p. 205